The requisite blood-fest finale notwithstanding, a polished work of suspense.
Camp counselors run amuck in Lehmann-Haupt’s chilling second novel (following A Crooked Man, 1995), set in a rustic 1950s Pennsylvania boys’ camp.
This nicely handled thriller is narrated by 17-year-old Jerry Muller, the product of divorced parents, who returns to his beloved Camp Seneca as a junior counselor in the summer of 1952. Jerry takes with him his eager, impressionable nine-year-old half-brother, Peter, whom he must take care of in order to show his father and new stepmother how responsible he is. Unnerving changes have occurred at the camp, however, involving the arrival of Native American Buck Silverstone, aka Redclaw, who has been given free reign by the camp owners to scare the kids. (He begins by telling a campfire ghost story about a mad cook of a lodge in nearby Lake Pymatuning who wields a meat cleaver.) Buck claims the camp land is actually Seneca land, haunted by ghosts buried there, and subscribes to a hybrid religion embracing torture and mutilation. In the camp’s spirit of building character, Buck instigates several nasty scares, some of them turning violent. Jerry, who is still on crutches after breaking a leg in a skiing accident, acts as a kind of wary observer, and writes his reservations about the camp to his young German stepmother, Karla. Additional tension stems from issues related to class (Jerry is wealthy and educated, while the majority of campers are working class) and sex (Jerry’s male friend makes unwelcome advances).
The requisite blood-fest finale notwithstanding, a polished work of suspense.Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2005
ISBN: 0-684-83427-8
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2005
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Alamak! as they say in Singapore. Please say it isn’t over! Of course everything’s wrapped up perfectly and tied with a...
The final installment of this bestselling saga of life among the billionaires of Singapore puts the family matriarch at death’s door—which means somebody’s going to inherit her exquisite estate.
The fairy tale/soap opera/lux-a-thon that began with Crazy Rich Asians (2013) and China Rich Girlfriend (2015) comes to a fittingly majestic and hilarious end in Kwan’s third novel. When Su Yi’s health precipitously fails, Shang-Young family members from all over the globe assemble at Tyersall Park—some out of genuine concern, others to callously go after their piece of the pie (this contingent is led by the always hilariously awful and overdressed Eddie Cheng). The only two family members missing are those Su Yi is most attached to—her grandchildren Nicky Young and Astrid Leong. Nicky hasn’t spoken to his grandmother since he married beneath his station five years ago, and though he tries to rush to her side, the guards at Tyersall Park have been instructed not to let him in. How can that be? Meanwhile, Astrid is in the midst of getting engaged to her beloved Charlie Wu at a palace in India complete with elephants when paparazzi hell breaks loose, unleashing a chain of events that includes a leaked sex tape and a suicide attempt involving a Lindsay Adelman chandelier. As the sharks circle at Tyersall Park, related dramas play out around the globe, including an all-out, multicontinental war between Kitty Pong and Colette Bing. Also unfolding is the amazing back story of Su Yi’s secret involvement in World War II, which turns out to have significant bearing on her legacy. Readers who thought they didn’t like to read about rich people will quickly lose all high-minded pretensions as they revel in the food, fashions, real estate, and art so lusciously strewn through this irresistible, knowing, and even sometimes moving story. Things that are this much fun are usually illegal.
Alamak! as they say in Singapore. Please say it isn’t over! Of course everything’s wrapped up perfectly and tied with a (priceless, hand-painted, 15th century) bow—but not since we were kicked out of Hogwarts and Downton Abbey have we felt so adrift.Pub Date: May 23, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-385-54223-4
Page Count: 416
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Aug. 5, 2017
An ambitious, absorbing caper that’s smartly paced, tough-minded and infused with emotional depth.
Mallon’s latest historical novel (after Bandbox, 2004, etc.) takes us back to the nominally peaceful mid-1950s, when the twin menaces of Communism and homosexuality were the real enemies of all things American.
Taking a page or two from Gore Vidal, Mallon juxtaposes the progress of Wisconsin Sen. Joseph McCarthy’s vindictive Un-American Activities Committee with the (similarly verboten) “subversion” practiced by closeted State Department whiz Hawkins Fuller (of godlike face and form, and shifting loyalties) and the young naïf who worships him. Callow senatorial aide Tim Laughlin is soft-shelled meat for the rapacious sexual appetites of the “Hawk”: A gentle, good Catholic boy who hoped political life might make a man of him, he refuses—even in the confessional—to repent of the dark pleasures to which Fuller subjects him. Their relationship takes place over a span of several years marked by the Korean War’s conclusion, the Suez Crisis, the Hungarian Revolution and the looming national prominence of V.P. Richard Nixon and Sen. John F. Kennedy. Though the large load of exposition required is not always successfully dramatized, we do learn much about the major issues of the time, and Mallon proves adept at making complex geopolitical matters flesh by filtering them through the viewpoints and agendas of both his principal fictional characters and a lively horde of historical ones, including Washington columnist Mary McGrory, Joseph McCarthy’s duplicitous attack dog Roy Cohn and miscellaneous members of Congress. The fallout from power politics is vividly shown in its destructive relation to Tim Laughlin’s selfless love and vulnerable idealism, as the Hawkins Fullers of the world ride the bubble of their charm, over bodies too numerous to count.
An ambitious, absorbing caper that’s smartly paced, tough-minded and infused with emotional depth.Pub Date: May 1, 2007
ISBN: 0-375-42348-6
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Pantheon
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2007
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
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